1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to communication systems. More particularly, it relates to methods and apparatuses for establishing communication sessions between a communication initiator and a recipient of the communication based on preferences of the recipient.
2. Description of the Related Art
Communication has become a vital part of every day life. For some people, being disconnected is a concept that is inexcusable. If not using office telephones, people use cellular telephones. If not accessing email via a home or office computer, people buy various devices that allow them to access email accounts outside the home or office.
With all these different modes of communication comes a long list of communication points of contact. These points of contact range from telephone numbers, including numbers for cell phones, faxes, home phones, office phones, and pagers, to postal addresses, to email addresses. With different competing companies offering different services, these points of contact (POC) can often be subject to change. For some people, these changes happen more frequently than for others.
Out of a need to consolidate a person's points of contact a new breed of company has developed. These companies aim to consolidate an individual's communication needs into one portal. Such companies, referred to here as a communication portal service company, give a subscriber to that service one telephone number. This one telephone number is intended to replace all other telephone numbers. The subscriber could then give out only one telephone number to his or her clients and friends, as opposed to the slew of numbers he or she would normally give out.
However, people using such communication portal services still have to supply additional contact information. For example, a subscriber to one of these communication portal services would still have to provide others with the subscriber's various email addresses and physical addresses associated with the subscriber. These communication portal services, while consolidating some information, in the end give the subscriber yet another number for people to remember. The result is that instead of making the list of POC's shorter, these communication portal services add yet another item to the list of contact information associated with the subscriber. Accordingly, there is a need to consolidate all or many of a person's POC's into one ID.
As with any POC, it needs to be unique to the individual and recognized as such from a global perspective. People's names, as is commonly known, are not useable as ID's because, in general, they are not unique. As an example, the name John Smith is a very common name and does not uniquely identify only one person. Telephone numbers on the other hand, are unique and have been used for decades to place telephone calls. However, telephone numbers do not reflect their owner's name and often can be difficult to remember. Moreover, telephones are designed with keys for entry of numeric telephone numbers, and do not easily facilitate entering non-numeric information.
Email addresses are both unique and often reflect an individual's name. For example, an individual named John Smith might have the email addresses jsmith@domainame.com, john@domainame.com, john.smith@domainame.com, js@domainame.com, john.smith@domainame.org, etc. In these examples, “domainame” indicates the network domain in which the subscriber, John Smith, has an email account. The individual also can have email accounts with other service providers using different network domains. Accordingly, in the example here, John Smith could have additional email addresses for different network domains, such as John.Smith@domainame1.com, John.Smith@domainame2.com, etc. Each of these email addresses would be recognized as relating to John Smith's name, and are more likely to be remembered than his telephone number.
Some communication portal services offer unified messaging or unified communications services. Such services allow a caller to leave a message for a recipient using a variety of means, such as facsimile machines, telephones, and computers, and then store those messages in a message box for the recipient to retrieve. These communication portal services might also notify a recipient of new messages in a variety of ways, such as by voicemail, email, etc. However, these services do not provide a communication session between a caller and a recipient, but only allow for messaging between them.
Other services and systems enable a caller to connect with a variety of devices designated by the recipient, but require the caller to use a computer to access a web page containing the recipient's contact information. The web page returns the recipient's contact information to a program, such as a Java applet, on the caller's computer so the caller can use the program to contact the recipient using the returned contact information. However, by returning the recipient's contact information to the caller's computer, the recipient's contact information is in jeopardy of being disclosed to the caller. Further, such systems do not automatically establish a communication session with the recipient's preferred point of contact, but require additional action by the caller or the caller's computer to initiate the contact. Further still, the caller must use a computer with a highly functional web browser to initiate the contact. No communication portal services allow a recipient to distribute easily remembered point of contact information, such as the recipient's email address, that a caller can use to automatically establish a communication session with the recipient's preferred point of contact. Accordingly, there is a need for such a service and a system to enable that service.